Magical Mount Washington Summit

What the view from atop Mount Washington was
on September 12, 2014.  

The summit of Mount Washington is usually a forbidding place: Hurricane force winds, ice, temperatures way below zero, insane wind chills, and summer snow sometimes.

On other occasions, Mount Washington is magical.

I missed it when this video came out, but back on the night of September 12, the aurora borealis were visible in much of the northern third of the United States, and other countries in the Great White North.

Atop Mount Washington, a low overcast shrouded northern New England during the early part of the evening, but the top of the mountain poked above those clouds.

So you had what is known as an "undercast" and a clear sky above the mountain.

So we get this wondrous time lapse video of the aurora, along with views of the undercast coursing over ridges, and past the top of Mt. Washington.

We also get images of sunrises and sunsets, the lights of little towns in the valleys, lights that get lost in pockets of fog that form near the rivers.

Like I said, it's magical.

Here's the video:

Aurora Borealis (Mostly) Lived Up To Its Billing: Great Photos

From @DaveThroupEA on Twitter. A volcano and
Northern Lights in Iceland last night.  

The Aurora Borealis, or Northern Lights, put on an excellent show in much of the Great (Whitish) North of the world last night, pretty much as expected.

For a couple days before the event, scientists said a bigger than usual solar storm would help light up the skies, especially since the solar eruption was sort of, but not perfectly aimed toward Earth.

Twitter lit up with examples of some great views, and I've shared some in this post. The most shared has to be the first one in this post.

It was taken in Iceland, and you see the Bardarbunga volcano erupting with the Northern Lights overhead.

@hangingditch on Twitter provided this view
from Cumbria, UK.  

There might be more auroras tonight, but it probably won't be as widespread and spectacular as last night.    

The best comment about the Aurora last night came from @btvjim, otherwise known as That Guy, who Tweeted: "Isn't Aurora a dancer at Club Super Sex?"

Dan Russell, who is @DanRuss on Twitter, took
this shot over Lake Champlain near Burlington, Vermont
last night. 

Goran Strand caught this other worldly view in Sweden.  

The Mount Washington Observatory in New Hampshire got this
spectacular view. You can see an undercast of clouds
in the valleys beneath the mountain summit glowing
in the light from the Norther Lights.